


Handle with Care

by fandammit



Category: One Day at a Time (TV 2017)
Genre: F/M, mostly Schneider-centric
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-03-11
Updated: 2019-03-11
Packaged: 2019-11-15 16:44:28
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,029
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18077162
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/fandammit/pseuds/fandammit
Summary: You can love a shirt or a movie or an album or a restaurant – you can even talk about how much you love those things, you can say out loud I love you to this inanimate thing if it doesn’t bother you to have people look at you weird (which he’s used to, so whatever) – and you never have to worry that this thing won’t love you back because guess what? It isn’t supposed to.As a bonus, that thing will never laugh in your face, it will never shake its head at you and saythat’s not how we do things in this family, it will never walk away without saying it back for your entire life.





	Handle with Care

It’s 9:30 at night and he’s holding the complete Commodore Jazz Recordings on Vinyl, Collection 1, and trying to see if it sparks any joy. 

It doesn’t, which he basically already knew even before he held it. So he just sighs and sets it to the other side of him in the now comically large pile of everything else in his apartment and in his life that doesn’t bring him joy – all the gifts from Avery that no longer even make him sad to look at, the collectible toys he got at comic con three years ago, the expensive yarn he bought during his knitting phase. 

If his humor skewed a little more cynical, he might say that he should just set himself in that pile, too. 

He stuffs that thought back down into himself, though not before it pulls up that cutting inner voice of his – the one that sounds eerily similar to his father – that tells him how worthless he is. He gets through about a dozen more records before it gets too loud, and then he’s pulling out his nine month chip and running his fingers over the edges of it, smoothing them over the contours of the serenity prayer on the back of it. 

It quiets the voice a little, but not enough to push back the rising tide of obsession that always led him to the nearest bottle. So he pushes himself up off the floor and steps over the walls of stuff he’s erected around himself, and heads out of his apartment, his mind already picturing the soft yellow walls of the Alvarez’s apartment. 

* * *

“Hey Schneider,” Penelope calls out as he comes in through the front door. She doesn’t even look up from the pile of laundry she’s folding – just shifts over on the couch to make room for him. “Did you finally realize that having an entire shelf dedicated to jazz albums you’re never going to listen to didn’t spark joy?” 

He forces a smile onto his face, and he’s glad that Penelope is still looking down at the polo shirt she’s folding in her lap because he doesn’t think what’s on his face looks anything close to genuine. 

He doesn’t say anything though, just tries to figure out a way to talk about his swirl of emotions that isn’t just  _I’d really like a drink right now._ When he can’t, he tries to figure out a way to say he thought about throwing himself out in a way that seems more soft and deprecating than it does cutting and cynical because by now he knows he’s been quiet for just a beat too long. 

In the end, he doesn’t have to, because he feels Penelope’s hand come over to rest on top of his. 

“Hey,” she says gently, her body turned towards him, her eyes soft and warm, anxiety simmering at the edges. “What’s wrong?” 

* * *

If he’s really being honest with himself, he thinks he might be better with things than with people. 

See, things are easy to label and sort and categorize – this is a lamp, that is a car, over there is the actual prop head of the T-Rex from Jurassic Park. The categories make sense and, as a plus, none of them ever make him feel bad about himself. 

People, though – they’re nearly impossible to sort, and when you do, it almost always makes you feel bad. About yourself, mostly, but just about the whole system in general sometimes, too. 

Because the label  _father_  should be someone who loves you and cares for you but it isn’t, and the label  _horse groomer_  and  _tennis instructor_  and  _manicurist_  maybe shouldn’t fall under the category of people who knew all the places you used to hide when you were feeling bad about yourself (fifteen places in total). 

Also, if a thing makes you feel bad, you can get rid of it. You can forget that it ever hurt you to have it. You can eventually even forget that you got rid of it and get a whole new thing just like it. Maybe you even buy the exact same thing again twice – not that he’s done that more than four times in his life. 

But people are the exact opposite. If they make you feel bad, you never get rid of that feeling. Not really. No matter what and where that person goes, no mater how far away from you they run – you never forget it. 

It’s people who leave you, rather than the other one around. And it’s the ones who leave, the ones who forget about you – who eventually forget that they ever even left you – who manage to hurt you the most.

And you can love a shirt or a movie or an album or a restaurant – you can even talk about how much you love those things, you can say out loud  _I love you_ to this inanimate thingif it doesn’t bother you to have people look at you weird (which he’s used to, so whatever) – and you never have to worry that this thing won’t love you back because guess what? It isn’t supposed to. 

As a bonus, that thing will never laugh in your face, it will never shake its head at you and say  _that’s not how we do things in this family,_ it will never walk away without saying it back for your entire life.  

* * *

He doesn’t say all that, of course. 

Instead, he heaves a sigh as he looks over at Penelope. 

“Looking at all my stuff made me want to drink again.” 

She doesn’t say anything at first, and in that pause he has time to think about how if this was even six months ago, she might’ve said something like  _yeah, looking at your stuff makes me want to drink, too._  

But then he has to erase that entire train of thought because nine months ago he didn’t even think of drinking, and he doesn’t think Penelope would’ve ever made light of it like that. Even if him drinking then had just been some far off history, some far flung reality, and the words  _want to drink_ no longer really entered in his vocabulary.  

Now it feels like a threat that hangs over everything he does.

Penelope nods, then scoots closer to him. 

“Why do you think that is?” 

He reaches up to straighten his glasses and takes a deep breath in, letting it out again slowly, his mind grasping for the easiest way to get it all out. 

“My dad is never going to love me,” he finally says, closing his eyes partially because the words hurt even though they’re true, partially because he isn’t sure if he wants to see how Penelope will react. “Not the way I want him to.” 

There isn’t really a connection between his confession, Penelope’s question and his answer – at least, not one outside the twisted threads of his own musing – but it turns out it doesn’t matter. She’d either figured it out on her own – a combination of how smart she is and how well she knows him – or she didn’t need one. 

She knows just the right thing to say any way. 

“That has nothing to do with you, Schneider.” She reaches up and brushes her fingers against his cheek as she turns his head so that he’ll look at her. “That’s all on him.” 

 _Is it?_ That voice inside him says, and maybe Penelope is close enough now to hear it, because she gives him a look that’s somehow equal parts ferocious and tender as she squeezes his hand. 

“It is, Schneider,” she says firmly, the look in her eyes daring him to disagree.

He stares at her a moment longer, that fluttering in his chest that he’s now come to expect at her touch and her stare beating back the drum beat of his father’s long disappointment. 

He tears his eyes away from her, because more recently staring at her too long has felt something close to dangerous for him and those are feelings he needs to sort through when he isn’t trying to sort through this set of feelings. 

“It still sucks though,” he says, trying to keep his voice light and failing, mostly. “Like, a lot.” 

She sighs and nods her head. 

“It does.” She tugs him towards her and wraps her arms around him, her hands coming to rest on his back, his wrapping around her shoulders. “Your dad sucks,” she says, her voice muffled in the folds of his shirt. 

He huffs a laugh – small and short, but genuine. 

“He really does, doesn’t he?” He presses his face into her hair, his cheek nuzzling against her soft curls as he moves just a fraction closer to her. “This doesn’t, though.” 

“Mhm,” she murmurs, her hands softly brushing up the lines of his back. “I’m glad you decided to come down here, Schneider. You know you always can.” 

He nods. 

“I knew it before you did.” 

She laughs, shaking her head against the curve of his shoulder before she tips her head up to look at him. 

“So you wanna sleep on our couch tonight?” She smiles. “Then tomorrow after breakfast, I’ll come up and we can Marie Kondo the crap out of your place together.” 

He blinks rapidly in surprise. 

“Pen, you don’t have to do that.” 

She shrugs.

“I know. I want to.” 

“And, I mean, staying here –.” He clears his throat. “I’m fine sleeping at my place.” 

She cocks her head at him. 

“But do you want to?”

He gives her a long look, then shakes his head. 

“No, I don’t.” 

She nods her head, then slowly slides away from their embrace. He thinks it’s just a trick of his own wanting that it seems like she does it reluctantly, but it’s still nice to consider it – however briefly. 

She doesn’t let go of his hand though, just keeps it wrapped in hers as she stands in front of him. 

“I’ll go grab some blankets and a pillow, can you turn off all the lights?” 

He nods, and she smiles at him before she gives his hand one last squeeze, and lets go. He grabs the stack of clothes on the other side of him and hands them to her before she goes back towards her bedroom. 

He toes off his shoes, then quietly walks over to the kitchen to shut off the lights. He makes sure to put the clean dishes in the drying rack away before he does, then walks back to the living room, where Penelope is tucking in a sheet around the couch cushions. 

“I gave you a blanket, but there’s also the throw in case you get cold,” she says, stepping back from the couch. 

He nods and makes his way to it, sitting down and stripping off his socks and putting them in his shoes. He straightens up, then looks over at her. 

“Hey, so you know what I thought while I was trying to figure out what sparks joy? 

“What?”

“That I should just throw myself out.” 

He tries to say it light and airy, means it as a joke. He even smiles when he says the words, though he realizes too late that it feels brittle at the edges. 

Penelope looks at him for a brief moment, then steps forward and wraps her arms around him. His own immediately come up around her, his limbs tight around her shoulders, the weight on his own loosening. 

"Are you trying to see if I spark joy?” He asks, the teasing in his voice extra loud to cover up his own soft yearning. 

She shakes her head.

“I already know that you do.” She tips her head up to look at him, her chin resting against his chest. “So you can’t throw yourself out because I’m keeping you.” She hugs him tightly against her. “Ok?” 

He takes a deep breath and smiles. His hand wants desperately to come up and brush back the loose curl that’s fallen across her forehead. 

He settles instead for splaying his fingers across her shoulder blade as he nods. 

“Ok.” 


End file.
